


white noise

by darlingneverland



Category: Teen Titans (Animated Series)
Genre: Gen, Not Romance, Post-'Things Change', lots of blood mention, seriously she can't stop seeing blood, stalking warning, the one where terra is pulling a major lady macbeth, will i ever let terra be Happy?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-19
Updated: 2016-01-19
Packaged: 2018-05-15 01:09:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 731
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5766208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darlingneverland/pseuds/darlingneverland
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There’s always a man across the street, in a black car, a nice one, an expensive one. She tells herself, he’s probably just picking up one of the other kids. She tells herself, this has nothing to do with me. She tells herself, stop looking. </p><p>But the man in the black car is familiar in all the ways she knows he shouldn’t be. The man in the black car is familiar in all the ways she can’t put a name to, not yet.</p>
            </blockquote>





	white noise

**Author's Note:**

> Your death feels like a  
> stone stuck in your throat.  
> Your executioner tells you  
> not to worry, he’ll have  
> it out in just a second,  
> but his fingers on your  
> throat feel like hailstones  
> and you’re ever so cold.
> 
> Your death feels like a  
> snowbank in your stomach;  
> a thousand tonnes of ice  
> sitting on your chest, and  
> your teeth are chattering  
> so much you can barely hear the  
> executioner when he asks you  
> to repeat your last words.
> 
> Can you remember what you said?  
> You told him you were scared,  
> you told him  
> you couldn’t remember the  
> last time you weren’t scared,  
> you told him you didn’t want  
> to be scared anymore but
> 
> you still didn’t tell him your name.  
> THE EXECUTIONER’S LOVER (PART THREE) - A. DAVIDA JANE

The sight of blood is a comfort. It leaks onto the floor from – she’s not sure _**where**_ , exactly, other than it’s from her, from her broken body, her battered body. Everything aches. Everything bleeds. She is skin and bones and blood. 

Her eyes squint at the pool of blood on the stone floor. The color is dark, almost black. But she knows it’s blood; recognizes it even when she can’t think of her name. 

She thinks, there’s currently ten major tectonic plates known, comprising a bulk of the Pacific Ocean and the continents. The boundaries are roughly definable. They’re subdivided into major, minor, and microplates and typically consist of materials oceanic crust and continental crust. 

She remembers the fact tectonic plates are pieces of the Earth’s crust, that they form the lithosphere, that they’re generally 100 kilometers thick. She remembers the sensation of them moving, even when she hadn’t been near or on them. She remembers the connection, the way she felt tethered to them, but she can’t remember her name, can’t remember where she’s from, can’t remember what she’s done to deserve lying on the ground she hated, bleeding. 

* * *

 

Three months later and her hands are still blood stained. 

She washes them, almost obsessively. Whenever she looks down, she sees the blood under her bitten nails, sees drops crusted on her fingers. No matter how hard she scrubs, the blood stays, the blood stays. 

She wears a cardigan to school. Every day of the school week, she’s careful never to leave her dorm without one on. During class, during lunch, during the seven minutes to switch class, she pulls the sleeves till they cover her hands. 

* * *

 

There’s always a man across the street, in a black car, a nice one, an expensive one. She tells herself, he’s probably just picking up one of the other kids. She tells herself, this has nothing to do with me. She tells herself, stop looking. 

But the man in the black car is familiar in all the ways she knows he shouldn’t be. The man in the black car is familiar in all the ways she can’t put a name to, not yet. 

Every day, she walks Amber and Dionne to the school gates before she heads towards the library to study. And every day she catches the man’s eye. He smiles at her the friendly way strangers smile at you, the way that means you’re a familiar face but still unknown. 

She’s not a religious person, at least in this lifetime, but she prays they never meet. 

* * *

 

“You can’t tell Beast Boy about this.”   


Raven stares at her. Her eyes are large, dark. There’s no bags under them like the last time she remembers seeing her. The memory is hazy, like fog, but she remembers the bruise-like bags weighing under Raven’s eyes. 

The coffee shop hums with quiet conversation. She clutches at her third cup of black coffee. 

“There’s something wrong with me. With my brain.”   


Raven raises an eyebrow. 

“I can – I can only remember some things. A little bit of things.” She stares down at her hands, at the red skin around her nails, the blood she swears is still there. “Can you heal me?”   


“I don’t think I can do anything to fix memories.” Raven picks up her cup of tea, the steam curling in the air. She takes a small sip, still looking right at her. “I can check if there’s any lingering injuries from…what happened to you. But I don’t think it’ll do much. It’s most likely trauma.”   


“Trauma affects the brain. If you heal my brain, you fix the trauma.”   


This time she doesn’t look up from her hands. She keeps her gaze on them, not willing to check if there’s any change to Raven’s expression. Pity from her would be worse than any lasting brain damage. 

* * *

 

The man in the black car waves her over today. Bile rises in her throat. She crosses the street, clutches her textbook to her chest. 

The smile on his face is no different than any other day, but he holds out his hand till she holds hers out. He drops something in her palm, something cold, metal. She looks down. Something clicks when she sees the silver butterfly clip. 

She looks back up. The man in the black car smiles at her, his one eye crinkling at the corner. 

**Author's Note:**

> ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯¯\\_(ツ)_/¯¯\\_(ツ)_/¯¯\\_(ツ)_/¯¯\\_(ツ)_/¯


End file.
